The EMI scheme provides top quality training for highly motivated, bright and enthusiastic clinicians, and non-clinical scientists in the design and execution of Experimental Medicine studies, equipping them with the knowledge and skills to lead Experimental Medicine studies in the future.

Training will be customised to the needs and experience of the individual and is open to clinicians at all career levels, as well as a small number of talented non-clinicians keen to work at the interface between pre-clinical and clinical science. The main emphasis will be on PhD studentships and postdoctoral fellows, the latter provided by the creation of EMI Academic Clinical Lectureships (ACLs). There will also be opportunities for MPhils, more junior academic clinicians, and senior consultant level posts.

All trainees will have the opportunity for hands-on exposure to the design and conduct of EM studies investigating the therapeutic potential of new drugs in collaboration with our industrial partners. These will usually be early phase clinical trials designed to provide early proof of concept, to identify biomarkers or stratifiers of response; or be physiological studies to probe pathophysiology of diseases or toxicology. Projects are developed jointly from an early stage, between academic and pharmaceutical supervisors, and where possible, trainees. For PhD students, the project will form the centre-piece of their research, and may also involve more laboratory-centred research.

Trainees will have the opportunity to spend time with their industrial supervisor to undertake research and/or obtain exposure to other aspects of EM to meet their personal training needs. Where appropriate, trainees may also join the taught component of the University of Cambridge’s MPhil in Clinical Sciences/EM, which will afford formal teaching in a wide range of translational and pharmacological areas such as drug development, pharmacokinetics, toxicology, and statistics. The Scheme will also equip trainees with the skills required to communicating research findings to academic and other audiences through academic publication and other routes.